


From Flatbush Ave to Scramble Alley

by TamerLorika



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pacific Rim Fusion, Canon Disabled Character, Canon-Typical Violence, Established Relationship, Howling Commandos - Freeform, Jaeger Academy, Jaegers (Pacific Rim), M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pre-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Pre-Slash, Protective Bucky Barnes, but eventually not pre-slash, or will be
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-01
Updated: 2016-01-24
Packaged: 2018-04-12 08:15:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4471991
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TamerLorika/pseuds/TamerLorika
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They finally let Steve into the Jaeger Academy in 2016, and Bucky came with him. They know they're drift compatible - how could they not be? The question is, can Steve handle the physical demands of being a Jaeger pilot? And can either of them bear it if he can't? </p><p>Obligatory Pacific Rim!AU for MCU Captain America; they'll be in it until they save the world (or, I suppose, until the end of the line)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

They came out of the simulator shaking, weak-kneed, and reaching for each other’s hand.

“Fuck—“ Bucky breathed. His head rang with the clashing sounds of the Kaiju roars and the muffled heaviness of _Steve_ , as vague and warm and comforting as his fingers tangled in Bucky’s.

“Yeah,” agreed Steve, and Bucky made a note to find out if his breathlessness was exertion or awe.

“Bagged our first kill,” Bucky said instead, still not quite focusing, echoing and replaying the sim in his head. It wasn’t drifting—not even close—but the sim pods let him feel the persistent tug of his partner at the edges of his brain, tugging, moving them together as they locked down on the hologram of Karloff on screen.

It was terrifying, it was heady, it was a moment of victory and power, of the things they could build together. Bucky found that he needed to look at Steve’s face, see if he was feeling the same. They were supposed to exit the pod, debrief with the rest of the training squad, but Bucky stopped, letting Steve run absently into his broad chest. Unable to help himself, he cut off Steve’s annoyed yelp and tilted his chin up so he could see his partner’s eyes. They were blown wide, black almost swallowing the sweet baby blue.

“Bucky,” Steve breathed, his wan face breaking out in a wild grin. “If we was that good in there, on the sim—Imaging what we’ll be when we Drift.”

That filled Bucky’s heart right up with aching hope.

Ranger Carter—who they called by her title, even though she hadn’t  yet been placed in a Jaeger—hauled open the sim, and there was the rest of the training squad, Falsworth and Dernier and Morita and Jones and DumDum—all clamoring for them and congratulating them on the drop.

* * *

 

Steve and Bucky had joined the PPDC, finally, in 2016 in Fort Lauderdale. It had taken that long to get Steve past screening—they’d tried to join up since the first Jaegers were launched, when Steve was just sixteen and Bucky a strapping seventeen and a half. The Brooklyn office wouldn’t take them. They might have looked the other way for 6’1’’, 185 pound James Buchanan Barnes, but not tiny little Steve Rogers, who had pneumonia at recruitment and who Bucky wouldn’t have left alone on a dare—not if the safety of the rest of the world was to be preserved. The thing was, the kaiju kept coming and able-bodied citizens did not, and if Steve was cracked out on codeine for the medical review, well, he could put up enough of a fight that the tired nurse just stamped his forms and told himself that the kid would be weeded out in the first week.

Except he wasn’t. Except he was tough and stupid and drift-fucking-compatible, and that, alone, was enough these days.

* * *

 

“Tomorrow,” Bucky muttered, six weeks after their first sim drop, into where his mouth was smushed against Steve’s shoulder. They were in the bottom bunk, where they always seemed to end up, whether or not Dernier and Jones were in the room. No one stopped them—no one cared what rangers or trainees did with their incomprehensible closeness, and the other guys that shared the barracks already set up the rules—fucking in the showers only, or go somewhere the fuck else so no one had to hear it or smell it. Not that Steve and Bucky had. Or would. Not now, at least. All they needed was this.

They were boxer-clad and skin to skin and _ready¸_ ready for the promise of the last three years at academy.

“Do you think we can do it?” Bucky mumbled.

“Your breath tickles,” Steve complained without moving from Bucky had wrapped himself around him. One wrong move would send them both toppling from the narrow mattress. It had before.  “We’d better be ready,” he grumbled. “We’ve been in the sim pod at _least_ half the week.”

“The log said twenty-three hours, seven drops,” Bucky mumbled, not pointing out that most of those times it was because _Steve_ wanted “one more hour”. It was important, whoever’s idea it had been. They had to get it _right_. They couldn’t fail now.

“Hey,” Steve said softly, dropping his tired grumping for a moment to get Bucky’s full attention. He scratched his blunt nails along Bucky’s shoulder, and felt Bucky shiver in response. “We’re going to show them all at the Kwoon tomorrow—do you really think you and I aren’t Drift compatible?”

“No,” Bucky muttered, a little petulantly. And he didn’t, didn’t doubt that he and Steve belonged in a giant mech together, but always there was that one, tiny, worrying thought. They’d tried to spar before, and at first had pushed it, choreographed it, preparing for the moment that they would be called on to prove themselves. It hadn’t gone well. Steve was just too quick, too jumpy, had two left feet, and Bucky felt big and clumsy beside him, too powerful and slow. Bucky pretended not to see that at the end of their first sparring session, Steve was so frustrated he was tearing up.

“Maybe we should—“ Bucky was going to say _stop_ , for the night at least, but he was so tired he had almost forgotten that _‘stop’_ was never a word you said to Steven Grant Rogers, not if you wanted to live through it. The kid had come at him like a canon-ball, roaring and bearing his teeth, furious and scared and ready to put up his dukes.

Bucky almost got his brain knocked around, barely flinging up his bo in time—and then wincing as the butt of the staff flew by him again, and again. Steve was rolling, throwing every strike they’d been taught, a mad little ball of anxiety—and Bucky  might have doubted that he could keep up, but this was little Stevie, and Bucky had spent his entire life keeping up with Steve Rogers. He wasn’t going to let the punk lay him out over one shitty sparring match.

Smirking with just the edge of aggression, Bucky leaned in and hit _right back_.

They went on in a blur of speed and wood and bashed fingers, landing few hits but keeping right on through the sting of the ones that landed. It wasn’t until they heard a wolf whistle from the corner that they both froze, aware they had an audience. They might not have stopped if they’d not heard; not until Steve’s lungs gave in or Bucky’s fingers gave out.

As it was, the whole squad was arrayed against the wall of the Kwoon, the guys lounging against the wall trying not to seem impressed, Ranger Carter looking down her nose with a sharp expression.

“If this was an art we taught you for self defence, you would be dead at this point,” she observed drily. “You had defensive holes everywhere, if you’d been experienced enough to find them.”

But Bucky hadn’t been looking for holes, hadn’t been looking at the staff at all. He’d been looking at Steve, the way his brows furrowed in concentration and exertion, the shaking rise and fall of his chest, the way his ropey, stubborn biceps stood out in his arms.

“We all know who’s getting the damn Mark III,” DumDum grumbled from where he was leaning on Morita, much to the man’s dismay. “No one here is even close to that compatible.”

Peggy smiled fiercely, confirming DumDum’s suspicions. Falsworth pinched DumDum’s side to get him off Morita. In the ensuing wrestling match that encompassed, somehow, everyone but Peggy, Steve dove for the inhaler they’d smuggled in rather than let medical know about his asthma. He was grinning like a loon even as he scrabbled for breath.

So, no, Bucky wasn’t really entertaining the logic of not being compatible with Steve. It just wasn’t possible.

What was possible, was somehow, something toppling them from this moment of glory and taking him away from Steve. Bucky didn’t consider himself a pessimist, or even much of a realist sometimes, but he was never very logical when it came to Steve.

“We got this, Buck,” Steve promised, his nose buried somewhere in Bucky’s thick hair. “Tomorrow, Ranger Carter and Ranger Rumlow will pick their partners, and then you and I can go for the last open Jaeger. So chin up, I because I can’t make it on my own.”

No, he damn well couldn’t. “You won't have to. I’m not going anywhere,” Bucky told him, just barely stopping himself from scoffing, instead scooching in just a bit tighter and clutching just a bit harder. “I’m with you, ‘til the end of the line.”

“Til the end of the line,” Steve echoed, and they were quiet for a long moment.

Then Steve began to giggle.

“End of the Line. That would be a hell of a Jaeger name,” he said, chuckling even though it really wasn’t funny, or even clever.

Bucky bit him, just a little, right around the shoulder, and didn’t dignify that terrible idea with a response.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> See end for notes/warnings

Bucky woke up about once an hour that night, and by 0400 decided it wasn’t even worth trying anymore. Trials started at 0600, meaning Steve—and probably DumDum and Dernier, the bums—would stumble out of bed at 0545 and panic through cleaning their bunks for inspection.

The others could take a hike, but Bucky knew that, if that happened, Steve would skip breakfast and he would be, one, cranky, and two, shaky. They were all required to go at least three rounds that day—once, with Ranger Carter, once with the other partnerless Ranger Rumlow, and at least once with any candidate they wanted to make a case for being compatible with. So, in order to head off the meltdown of his partner trying to go three rounds on an empty stomach, Bucky rolled out from under where Steve’s leg had hiked over him in the night and went to raid the mess.

He went the long way, taking the cold halls at a jog. They’d joined in Fort Lauderdale, but the academy was on Kodiak Island, Alaska, and in October everything was already even more grey and biting than Brooklyn writers had been. He heard the sounds of wood cracking and soft swearing in French from the Kwoon—Gabe must have been up early, because Dernier was definitely still sawing logs in the bunk. Bucky jogged on.

Sure enough, by the time that Bucky had returned to the bunk a little after 0540, it was a mess of panicking Rangers-in-Training. Bucky tossed Steve an apple and a packet full of some nondescript breakfast pastry.

“Sharing is caring, Barnes,” DumDum grunted, wrenching his T-shirt over his head.

“I got your breakfast right here, babe,” Bucky cooed at him, gripping his crotch.

Morita almost choked laughing and DumDum was getting ready to throw a pillow at him.

“Line up boys,” Steve ordered, his voice low with sleep, way too loud and deep for his tiny little body. “Tim, your uniform is ass backwards—and Buck, put on your regulation boots or Marshall Phillips is gonna have a fit.”

Bucky was, sure enough, still in his running shoes. It sucked ass that they had to dress out even though they were just going to strip down for trials anyway, but it as a Momentous Day and Phillips would have their asses if they didn’t look like the rangers that they were training to become.

“Yessir,” Dugan huffed, but it was mostly an amused sound. No one contradicted Steve when he told them to do something. The little shit was bossy, but most of the time he was also right.

* * *

Bucky was stinging, exhausted, and bored. He had no right to be tired, of course—Ranger Carter had just gone six rounds, once with every member of the squad, and she had another six lined up that afternoon with a different batch of trainees.

The problem was that Carter had fucking pounded him. Bucky hadn’t wanted to hold his own, not really, because being compatible with Peggy Carter was not part of the plan, but neither did he want to be so far on the other end of “breaking even” in a fight against her. They’d ended the round 5-1.

Carter hadn’t really, truly resonated with anyone yet but, as much as it raised Bucky’s hackles, she’d been closest with Steve Rogers. Carter was a good sort, and made the mistake of trying to start Steve off soft, but the little beanpole had wanted no such thing. They’d ended 5-3, with two fairly impressive runs that had totaled more than five minutes each. Carter also very likely had a few uncomfortable bruises on her thighs, and it served her right for underestimating Steve.

But now Bucky was done with both of his matches—he’d sparred with Rumlow first out of the six, and had held out to a 4-5 round, but it was fast and uneven except for a single 4:36 run. Bucky tuned out the rest of the matches. It didn’t matter what anyone else did, or how they did it. What mattered was that he and Steve had their chance.

He was pretty sure that Steve threw the match with Rumlow on purpose—Bucky had briefly tuned in in the midst of one of their rounds, and caught the disapproving look on Marshall Philips’ face when the final 0-5 score.

Steve looked a little pale, and his strikes were coming slower than they should have, but the bored look on his face attested that Steve was probably not tired and more done. Rumlow had been one of the few trainees at the Academy that Steve had not gotten into a fight with, verbally or physically, but neither did Steve particularly like the man. “He just don’t sit right with me,” Steve had said one day, watching the Ranger eat alone in the mess. Steve had invited him to sit with them a few times that week, but each time Ranger Rumlow had given them a thousand-yard stare and stalked off with body language that read a whole lot like disgust.

“Yeah, and what kind of name is ‘Brock’, anyhow?” Bucky had mumbled around the powdered eggs he was shoveling in. Steve had snorted in response, even though he also kicked Bucky under the table. Bucky chalked that up to a win—Steve had absolutely been thinking it, but he was too goddamn noble to take a potshot at someone about something cosmetic like that. So Bucky was a shit so Steve didn’t have to be.

After his match ended, Steve grabbed his water bottle as he slumped down on the wall next to where the others were crouching, sweating and puffing but not wheezing, thank god. “We’re up soon,” he muttered to Bucky as Falsworth went to square off with Ranger Rumlow.

“Sure are,” Bucky whispered back, as if that hadn’t been what he’d been thinking for the past twenty minutes. 

They were up first, is what they were, and standing under the gaze of the Marshall, the Rangers, and their entire squad, Bucky felt a ridiculous and electrifying sensation of stage fright.

“Alright, boys” Marshall Philips barked, not noticing Peggy roll her eyes. “As you know, we have three Jaegers open for new Rangers. Ranger Carter and her partner will be given the Mark III ‘Howling Commando’, and Ranger Rumlow and his will be piloting Mark III ‘Winter Soldier.’ Finally, if a team of you really impresses me, you may be given the opportunity to pilot our last, unnamed Jaeger. If I don’t have your names on this sheet,” he waved it for emphasis, “you’re not eligible. First up, Barnes and Rogers.”

Bucky was gonna throw up. Steve grinned up at him as he slid into ready-stance. “’til the End of the Line?”

“We ain’t calling it that,” Bucky groused, and the Marshall yelled for them to start.

The first run was magnificent. They hadn’t been in the Kwoon in almost a week, not wanting to jinx themselves, and had instead spent all their time in the Sim. Their energy on the bo staves was even better than Bucky remembered, even more precious and heady. Steve fought like a thing possessed, showing off, sure, but also reveling in the fact that he was alive and was gonna fuck Bucky’s shit up, if he could.

Bucky rolled back at him, building slow but going faster and harder. It was wild, the feeling in his chest, of his partner across from him, knowing Steve could take everything Bucky threw at him and whip it right back. It was a warm, pleasant feeling in his chest even as his muscles burned with lactic acid and hope.

“Seven minutes!” he heard Morita shout from the side line, but Bucky wasn’t about to let this feeling go until he had to. Marshall Phillips would see that they could be the most devastating drift partners in the history of the Jaeger program and—

\--and Bucky had spaced out, thrown a wide strike that had no hope of hitting its mark, which Steve saw immediately. Steve lunged in for the kill, and Bucky knew it was going to hurt, so he toppled back and threw his forearms up to block and redirect the downward strike and hopefully save himself the worst of the bruising.

Steve saw that Bucky had changed tactics, saw too that maybe he’d been a tad aggressive with his kill strike, but when he tried to pull up at the last moment, he went too far and got the staff under him. Bucky went down, Steve went down, and Bucky heard a hollow cracking noise. It hadn’t come from him.

“Rogers, you okay—“ Bucky started even as he struggled to breathe through the impact. Then he saw what had happened. Steve must have fallen just right on their abandoned staves and smacked his head, because there was a gash on his temple that looked shallow but also not good.

That would have been the most worrisome, but Bucky wasn’t even focusing on the blood now, because Steve was having a seizure.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Added warnings for swearing, casual sexism, and sexual locker-room style bawdiness


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A special thank you to TeaLies -- I'd been having a lot of trouble getting the final scene to gel in my head, and I was going to just let it be for a few days. Thank you for the encouragement to finish the last bit and give you all an update. Every encouraging word I've gotten from all of you is invaluable to me, thank you to all my readers.

_“Di’ we kill’it?”_ Steve croaked as he woke. He could feel each of the individual muscles in his body aching desperately and his head felt scrubbed clean. He had to have been in a fight—had to have been in a Jaeger, fighting Kaiju with Bucky

_Bucky._

Bucky was there. Steve was having a hard time feeling sensations other than numbing pain in parts of his body—his left shoulder, his cheeks, his toes, he couldn’t feel any of them. Steve could, however, feel the distinct and familiar pressure of Bucky’s wide, rough hand around one of his. Bucky was seated in a hospital char head thrown back as he snored, legs oustretched and looking both sacked out and wildly uncomfortable.

Under Steve’s other hand was the vague sensation of something rough and nubbed and _no, it couldn’t be_ and then Steve remembered what had happened. He hadn’t even gotten into the pilot rig—he’d seized right there in the Kwoon, during the most important of the many fights of his life.

The rough rag beneath the hand not claimed by Bucky was the proof. Steve’s mother had made the rag bear for him, after his second seizure when he was six, because he woke up sensitive and agitated and craving the light stimulation. He hadn’t needed the bear or had an attack this bad since he was fifteen. He thought he’d never need it again. It was a surprise that Bucky still had it.

_Bucky_ , Steve thought again with a pang of helplessness. He gently rubbed his thumb across Bucky’s knuckles, but his friend didn’t stir. Out for the count, which was how Bucky had gotten through any of the multiple coughs and flu’s Steve had picked up over the years, even when they had to share a bed. Street noise, dangers, anything that might have hurt them, that all woke Bucky in half an instant. By now, however, Steve himself, his noises and movements and shuffling, barely interrupted Bucky’s snores.

“S’rry Buck,” Steve mumbled, hoarse and dry, into the beeping dark. “ ‘ll make sure they don’ take it out on you.”

He fell asleep quickly again, overwhelmed by the too-familiar hospital machines and too exhausted to fight it.

 

* * *

 

When Steve woke again, Ranger Carter was the one in the hospital chair, stiff-backed and not-reading the magazine flipped open in front of her.

“Hey—“ Steve tried to be casual, but instead his voice gave out before it even got through the vowel. Carter had the grace not to look startled, instead reaching for the cup of water and the straw on the bedside tray. She didn’t let him have nearly enough, but Steve knew the drill. Too much water at once would make his tender stomach churn, and vomiting at a time like this would be not just embarrassing but painful. Ice chips, however, were on his ‘okay’ list, and he fished one out of the cup, ignoring his shaking hands, before trying to ask his question again around a mouthful of his prize.

“’Ey, Ranger. How did trialsh go?”

Carter side-eyed him, her gaze clearly asking if he really wanted to play this game with her. Steve did. It was better than the alternatives, the questions and accusations and diagnoses and decisions that would come eventually but that he wanted to avoid for right now.

“Fairly well. They thought they’d found me a drift partner in Dugan, until we got through the second rounds yesterday.”

It was her way of telling him without telling him that he had been out of it for at least twenty-four hours. He’d collapsed around 0800 yesterday, and the second rounds had been scheduled later that afternoon. He’d missed them, and Bucky had spent the night by his bed. Wherever Bucky was now, Steve was hoping it was taking care of himself. The jerk tended to work himself up when Steve was in hospital.

“What ‘appened wit’ the other round?” Steve mumbled, then crunched his ice cube, even though it made his jaw hurt.

“Miss—well, Ranger now. Ranger Martinelli,” Carter gave Steve a calculating look. “Bright girl, spirit up to her ears. Quite scrappy thing, quick tongue.”

Steve grinned tiredly. Good. He’d hoped Ranger Carter would find someone to drift with. He and Peggy had been almost close, in the last few weeks of training, and she’d confessed to him that she worried she wasn’t truly compatible with anyone at all.

“So when—“ Steve began, but was interrupted by the door to the tiny room banging open and Bucky barging through.

And wasn’t he a sight—Bucky had clearly been bullied out of the room to go take care of himself, because while he was shaved and his hair glistened like he’d been shoved under a showerhead for at least a few minutes, he had Falsworth _and_ Morita at his heels bitching at him.

“Stop by the mess and grab _something_ for fuck’s sake—“ Morita was complaining loudly, but cut off when Bucky stopped stock still in the middle of the doorway.

Steve knew the details of Bucky by heart, even though someone had removed his contacts and he couldn’t make all of them out. He saw the way Bucky’s whole body stiffened stock-straight, the mix of alarm and elation on his face, and then watched as all the tension slowly drained out of his friend until Bucky was left lounging _almost_ casually, weight on one foot, arms crossed in front of his chest.

“Good to see you awake,” Bucky said, his voice a bit hoarse, but going for nonchalant.

Steve thought he heard Falsworth gagging, because really, who did Bucky think he was kidding? The kid was a mess of worry—usually unnecessarily, by Steve’s reckoning. This time, though, well, Steve knew they might actually have something to worry about. Like having a job still.

They _don’t_ have to worry about his current health though—Steve’s fine, really—so there is no way to feel too bad about rolling his eyes when Bucky asked Carter pointedly, “Anyone get the on-call nurse when they saw he woke up?”

Carter looked a bit sheepish but Steve couldn’t help but feel grateful. The very first check-over after he woke up, whether it’s from a fever or a faint or, the one memorable time, a stone-cold knockout with a four-by-four in an alley, was always the worst and most invasive. He’d be happy to put that off until someone forgot about it. No one could say Steve Rogers is responsible _all_ the time.

“I’ll get ‘em,” Morita said, heaving a sigh like he was so terribly put upon, but he too had relaxed when he saw Steve looking fairly alert and mostly alive.

“No, I will.” Carter uncurled herself from the chair smoothly. “We—all of us, in fact—have PT in fifteen minutes.”

Morita and Falsworth both looked at each other, eyes wide, and bolted. Steve hadn’t missed they were still in the civvy sweat bottoms that they slept in. Carter followed them at a much more serene pace. Bucky, however, would not be budged, and came to smugly reinsert himself into his seat. Steve watched Bucky levelly as he sprawled onto hard plastic, trying to pretend he hadn’t a care in the world.

“Always gotta be the center of attention, don’t you, Rogers?” Bucky snarked, and Steve was hit with guilt like a sucker punch. Not because Bucky was right, nor was he doing anything but joking with Steve like he always did. The problem was that Bucky’s hands were all knotted up into fists that he was trying to shove under his armpits to hide the fact they were trembling, just a little. The problem was that Bucky hadn’t asked him yet if he was okay or if he needed anything; normally, the boy was in mother hen mode. And yeah, Steve thought it was annoying when he hovered, but who was going to deny that for the first few scary moments of waking up to cold and white and anesthesia, that someone’s warmth and care was a comfort?

 The problem was that Bucky wasn’t playing to their usual, strangely comforting hospital routine, because he was focused on something bigger than that. And whatever it was, Steve had caused it.

“Out with it, Buck,” Steve muttered, trying not to let worry make him surly. “What’s the damage?”

Bucky ticked it off like the parts of a plasma gun on a munitions exam. “Self-inflicted blunt trauma to the head, whiplash from the fall and from the angle of the hit, partial concussion, and oh, I don’t know, a fucking Jacksonian seizure.” Bucky wasn’t yelling, but he was getting close, starting his list calmly but leaning forward in his seat, resting his crossed hands on his knees so he could get right upside Steve’s bed and glare at him.

Steve glared right back, shifting with pained effort so he could get up close to the edge of the bed. “That’s not it, Bucky, and we know it—you just said I had head trauma, so it can’t be an epileptic seizure. Haven’t had one in years anyway, it’s gotta be from getting hit in the head.”

Bucky snorted, but it wasn’t out of humor. His breathing was getting erratic. “Mighta thought that, except we’ve had three neurologists in here who all said the same thing: localized seizure on your left side. Your hemisphere side. Caused, each damn one of them was sure, because of _too much time in the sim pod_.”

Aw, geez.

“Now wait, we can’t be sure—“

“God damn, it, Steve, yes we fucking can. _They_ fucking can, the doctors, the people who get degrees in studying people’s brains. Two of them have been working exclusively with pilots for years and they all said it’s ‘cuz you were in the sim for probably six hours a day—“

“Well we had to, didn’t we?” Steve was struggling to sit straighter in the bed, ready to give it back to Bucky with both barrels. Bucky didn’t usually get this snippy out of worry, but Steve sure wasn’t going to take it lying down, literally or otherwise. “We had to get ready for trials, and it helped! We had a seven minute run, at least, and it was because of the practice—“

“—the posted warnings say three hours max, for people _without epilepsy_! If you hadn’t been such a fucking fool and kept asking to go just one more—“

“Oh, so this is _my_ fault?” demanded Steve, his voice low and cutting through Bucky’s tirade. He was coldly furious, and could have elaborated about how drift partners were _partners_ and if Bucky had wanted to stop them, he _could have_ , but…but then the question wasn’t rhetorical any longer.

Steve wasn’t prone to bouts of self-doubt but this was possibly the first time in his life when something that was beyond a choice he made for himself, when something that was an unchangeable part of _who Steve was_ , hurt someone else. Steve could be medically discharged for this, and Bucky could be out in the cold because of his pigheaded need to follow Steve into trouble, and then neither of them would be pilots…

…and _was_ that Steve’s fault?

Steve watched Bucky snarl at him. “What kind of stupid question is that?”

“One you’re not answering,” Steve shot back mulishly, his heart sinking.

For a moment, Bucky looked like he was going to start yelling again. Steve squared his shoulders and waited for it with steel in his spine and lead in his gut. The moment he tilted his chin up, though, ready to take it on the jaw, Bucky visibly deflated, breaking the tense eye contact they’d been spitting across.

“Don’ look at me like that, Stevie,” Bucky muttered.

“Like what?” Steve demanded.

“Like I’m one more bully you gotta fight.”

The air blew out of Steve fast as Bucky kept mumbling.

“You know none of this medical shit is your fault, hell, it’s probably mine for not putting two and two together and making you take a break—“

“Now wait, Buck—“

“—But I got distracted by the half-drift I guess and I didn’t see it either but damn it, Stevie, you can’t blame me for getting worried, the doctor said you must have felt it way before now, what the sim was doing to you.”

“They told us headaches and dizziness were part of it,” Steve mumbled, only just now realizing that maybe there _had_ been warning signs. “And I thought I was just normal PT exhausted.”

“No way, Steve, all I felt after coming off the machine was like I was floatin’ on a cloud in the middle of a thunderstorm—all crackly and untouchable. I was flying high after simming—but you were hurting, weren’t you?”

No, Steve was hurting _now_. Bucky looked so wistful as he talked about what he felt like after the sim. His blue eyes were focused on the wall behind Steve, all fogged over and distant. Steve couldn’t take that away from Bucky, not in one single fool move.

Steve closed his eyes. He knew when he was wrong. “Sorry, Buck.”

Bucky sighed and closed his eyes, but his hand found Steve’s. “Don’t be. Just…try not to scare the crap out of me so much, okay? I’m really done with all this hospital shit.”

If Steve could find any way to make it up to Bucky, he would.

“Yeah, well, I’ll get right on creating a medical miracle so you don’t have to sit in those ugly hospital chairs anymore,” Steve joked weakly, squeezing Bucky’s hand in his. He was exhausted, mentally and physically. “But after a nap. And you should get going to PT or Marshal Phillips is gonna chew your butt to pieces.”

Bucky grimaced. “Great visual, asshole.” He didn’t move from his chair, though, and in fact shifted to make himself a little more comfortable, digging in for what looked like the long haul.

Steve sighed and let him, having just averted one fight and not ready for any more. He fell asleep to the faint sensation of long, blunt fingers smoothing through his hair.

 

* * *

 

There wasn’t much in the way of timekeeping in the Shatterdome infirmary, but Steve didn’t think it could have been more than two hours before he was jarred out of sleep, this time by the very last face he wanted to see while he was still weak and vulnerable—this superior officer, and the man who ran the Academy and Shatterdome: Marshal Chester Phillips.

“Barnes!” the man barked, startling Bucky out of sleep with a yelp, even as he leapt to his feet and to attention on instinct. Steve felt his own spine go straight at the sound of his commanding officer’s bark.

“PT, now!” the man ordered. “Or I’ll write you up for abandoning your training program.”

Steve saw Bucky work his jaw like he did sometimes when he was gearing up for a fight, but didn’t know how to make it stop.

Marshal Phillips did. “Barnes, if you argue with me right now I will consider it directly opposing your superior officer. Do you understand?”

Bucky’s jaw stopped moving and instead set in an ugly scowl. “I understand.”

“Then go understand it in the training yard, soldier!”

Bucky left as ordered, but not before giving Steve a hard, lingering glance, sweeping him up and down as if to assure himself what kind of shape he was in.

“Marshal,” Bucky acknowledged with half a salute. He tipped his head at Steve. “Punk.” And then he was gone.

There was no reason for Marshal Phillips to be in the hospital, standing in front of Steve with his continual frown firmly in place, unless—

“You’re being medically discharged,” the Marshal told him, not mincing words. “You put up a hell of a fight out in the Kwoon, but you shouldn’t have been out there in the first place. Finally had a look at your medical file, and rest assured I’ve already had choice words with the recruiter who let you through.”

Steve stared straight at the Marshal, knowing exactly what was happening but unable to process it.

“I don’t usually come and discharge recruits in person,” the Marshal went on, taking Steve’s silence as acceptance, when really it was drugs and exhaustion and anxiety that was keeping Steve’s mouth clamped tight. “But you and Barnes pulled quite a stunt out there, and your run was seven minutes and forty-seven seconds. It’s a record for any team I’ve seen, and it’s impressive. But it distracted from the fact that Barnes pulled five minutes with Rumlow as well. That’s well above the threshold for compatibility.”

Steve could see something huge and terrible coming at him out of the darkness, but couldn’t make his brain work fast enough to put the pieces together until the Marshal spoke them out loud.

“I’m pairing up Barnes and Rumlow in a jaeger, and I need you to cooperate with me.” It was almost a request, out of anyone else’s mouth. Marshal Phillips said it like an order. “I’ve seen the stupid shit that boy does to follow you into trouble, and I will not have it in my ‘Dome. We need men like Barnes, who are able-bodied and hellfire in a Jaeger. Barnes has what it takes, and he’s grown to love it, I can see it on him. So I’m telling you this now—you’re out, Barnes is in, and I need you to do what’s best for the entire goddamn world and make sure he stays.”

Steve continued to stare dumbly at the Marshal, piecing it together and cursing himself for being so slow to react. This, his worst nightmare, was coming true. He was getting booted, _again_ , and Bucky would come with him and lose his chance—

“Buc—Barnes is in?” Steve asked, finally latching on to what was being said to him.

Phillips scowl deepened impressively. “That’s what I said. And that’s why I’m here now. I know my men, Rogers, and I know it’s best if you leave quietly. Don’t shake things up. We’re transferring you to our long-term medical care facility in Hawaii until your discharge is processed—consider it your injury pay. The ‘Hawk leaves in two hours.”

It seemed to be the last of Phillips’ speech, but he didn’t leave the infirmary after his proclamation, watching Steve sort out the sudden welter of _anger-fear-heartbreak-anger-panic_ that was playing on loop.

“Do the others know?” Steve asked, referring to his bunkmates, referring to _Bucky_.

Phillips landed him with a hard stare. “No. And that’s the other reason I’m here.”

Steve was already shaking his head. The Marshal might be his commanding officer, but he wouldn’t be for long, and so Steve could, and would, fight back. “I gotta tell the guys and Peg—Ranger Carter, and let them know what’s going on. I’ll pack my stuff and be ready for the Jumphawk.” He wasn’t sure if he could do that at all, actually, as he struggled to roll off his sheets and to his feet. His legs felt a lot weaker than he’d imagined. He could maybe get down the hall to the bunk, but getting back was a struggle all on its own. But he had to tell the others, maybe they could come up with a plan, keep him in the service. “There has to be another way, Marshal, can’t you give me a chance? I can’t sit there in Hawaii while our Rangers are out there in Jaegers giving their lives to save humanity!”

He expected the Marshal to yell at him, and was bracing for it, even as he considered the monumental task of putting his bare feet on the floor and standing upright. Instead, a new voice entered the room, soft and with a lilting accent.

“There is another way, Steven Rogers, and I think you’re the perfect candidate for it.”

A short man with gunmetal grey hair and a spark in his eyes walked slowly into the room, smiling warmly at Steve. He crossed in front of the Marshal to stand right in front of where Steve was perched on the edge of the bed.

“I’m Doctor Erskine,” the man introduced himself with a smile, shaking Steve’s hand. “And I am thinking you may not be at the end of your journey at all.”

The Marshal cleared his throat. “You get on that ‘Hawk without any fuss, and he will waive your discharge and re-enroll you under our new, _experimental_ , piloting program. But you leave my recruits in peace. We have a war to win, gentlemen, and I’m not going to let this upset my new recruits. They’ll let it go faster if you leave.”

Steve’s gut hurt with the implications of what he was being told. “I can pilot again?”

Erskine smiled softly and nodded in an encouraging manner. “If you excel in this program, we think we can have you in a Jaeger in only a few weeks.”

The Marshal made a noise as if that wasn’t too likely, but Steve had turned his attention away from the man already, and to the German doctor who was offering him hope on a silver platter. “I’ll do it, doc. If you this’ll get me back to the front lines and fighting at the sides of my—“ _my drift partner, my friends, my bunkmates_ “—at the sides of the Rangers, I’ll do it.”

The Marshal made another noise that could have been either disgust or acceptance. “We’ll have someone pack your things, and the med techs will be in to prep you for the flight.” He turned on his heel and marched out.

The moment the Marshal’s precise, clicking footsteps disappeared down the hall, Steve had rounded on Doctor Erskine.

“You’ll pass on a letter for me, won’t you?” Steve demanded.

The doctor looked surprised for a moment, then huffed out a laugh. “Why Steven, I do believe that we have selected the very best man for the program." He laughed again when Steve's determined stare didn't waver. "Yes, I will help you get a letter to this Ranger Barnes I’ve heard much about.”

Steve didn’t ask how Erskine knew who he wanted to talk to. It didn’t matter. What mattered was that he was going to pilot again, and he was going to be strong enough to be the drift partner that Bucky deserved and to do his duty on the front lines of the Kaiju War. What mattered was that whatever he said to placate the Marshal, he would never leave Bucky behind without the best of reasons, and he’d never disappear without letting his partner know.

“You’ll be back piloting at his side before you know it,” the doctor said confidently. “I’ve watched your training for a long time, _Herr_ Rogers, and I know that you are exactly what the program needs—what the world needs.”

It was good enough for Steve to be the partner that Bucky needed. They’d be out there, fighting for the good of their world together in no time.

 


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve and Bucky both learn their futures.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> leaves this here and runs away

Bucky had to be thrown to the mat twice before he could focus—he was just grateful that it was DumDum who was his partner and not any of the other guys. It’s not like Tim Dugan would pull his punches, but he wouldn’t give Bucky shit—or worse, pity—either.

“Go again,” was all Dugan said, before squaring upon the mat, bo at the ready.

Apparently, no one in the training unit was going to catch a break, even just after the Jaeger trials. The Marshall had them all on heavy P.T. for the next week, including a higher emphasis on modified Judo—for inevitable hand-to-hand with enormous alien monsters.

“You know who got the third Jaeger?” Bucky asked as he dodged an ice-pick strike to the head. He kept catching glimpses of Ranger Carter and the newly-minted Ranger Martinelli on the mats. They had forgone the staves completely and had digressed into some fierce and joyful wrestling.

“I don’t even know who got Winter Soldier,” DumDum puffed, spinning and trying to sweep Bucky’s legs out from under him. “They didn’t announce Rumlow’s partner yet.”

Bucky didn’t know how to feel about that. At first, the thrill of hope sang in his veins and he turned it into a hard staff thrust. He and Steve still had a chance. But Steve couldn’t pilot. Bucky wouldn’t let him. Med staff wouldn’t let him. And that thought made Bucky falter almost enough to get thrown _again_.

Bucky was disappointed he couldn’t pilot, sure. He would miss the half-drift of the sims with Steve; the warm, effervescent feeling of the gently popping champagne bubbles in his head. But he was more worried about Steve, who wanted so badly to be everyone’s defender. Bucky was selfishly, coldly glad that Steve would be out of danger.

Dumdum swept him again, and as he fell backwards he let out all of the swirling frustration and energy and anger at the wrath of the universe in one deep, forced out breath. Bucky landed hard on the mat and hissed, knowing he had two truths in his life at this moment:

  1. Steve was being discharged, and he would have to leave
  2. Steve would not leave alone. He would never be alone, if Bucky could help it.



The res—his own messy feelings and selfish love for the service and the fight, he could sort out later. They didn’t matter right now.

At least, not too much. He _could_ , however, indulge himself just a little by spending the last slice of time that he had here beating the crap out of DumDum, which he proceeded to try to do with varying degrees of success.

The two of them degenerated fast into what was becoming a down and dirty street fight rather than controlled sparring-much to both their delight and that of the other members of the squad who had drifted over to watch.

It was not the delicate dance of drift-sparring, but it _was_ fun, and even when Bucky had to tap out after getting headlocked and smushed into Dugan’s armpit, he was grinning.

Ranger Rumlow, conspicuously absent from PT all morning, strode over then. His face was unreadable, but he stuck out his hand to Bucky ad swung him up off the mat.

The man was strong in a brutish way, moving with a controlled economy, like he was saving his energy for a greater threat. Bucky blinked as they found themselves face-to-face—or rather, not quite, as Rumlow had a scant two inches on him.

“Thanks,” Bucky grunted, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

It did.

“Any time, Ranger,” Rumlow addressed him with a shrug, not warm but missing his typical hostile edge.

“I’m not a—“

But Peggy was looking at him steadily, not surprised, just wary and knowing.

It seemed the Marshal had found Rumlow’s drift partner, and Bucky’s heart iced over.

“No _fucking_ way,” he hissed, mostly to himself. “Nope.”

He turned around and rushed out of the Kwoon, shedding shouts of surprise and concern behind him like water. He was running before anyone thought to come after him, intent on reaching Steve. So what if he got court marshalled? They were leaving anyway.

When he clattered into Steve’s hospital room, however, Bucky felt his heart give one great stutter, and then stop completely.

Of course Steve wasn’t there. The hospital bed was empty, the sheets stripped. In the chair— _Bucky’s_ chair—sat a placid-looking man with thin round glasses and a receding hairline.

“Ranger Barnes,” the man greeted him in a thick German accent as he stood. He held out his hand as if for Bucky to shake, and Bucky felt the sudden urge to break the man’s fingers.

“Where is he?” Bucky demanded, even though he was sure he already knew.

The man simply kept his hand outstretched and after too long of a moment, Bucky saw the man was offering him something. A piece of paper. A note.

It was in Steve’s precise, perfect handwriting, the letters so flawless as to look like he’d “shit out a first grade grammar book” as Bucky liked to tell him.

With shaking hands, Bucky ripped open the note.

 

_~~James~~ _

_~~Jerk~~ _

_Buck;_

_They discharged me, and I bet you’re not surprised. I’m not leaving you for long, though._

_The Marshal wanted me to leave quietly, but you know that isn’t my style. They don’t want me leaving to upset the guys. Didn’t want you charging after my fool head, I guess._

_And I don’t want you to, either, because I have a secret. If I do real good, I can come back. Can’t tell you much right now, but I have a chance to get back in a Jaeger with you._

_So don’t ~~fuck~~ ~~mess~~ fuck it up, and keep the Jaeger warm for me, so I have a partner to come back to, okay? For me?_

_Til the End of the Line;_

_Steven G Rogers_

Bucky was pretty sure he was going to throw up. _Fucking_ Rogers. How did that punk get off scaring the shit out of Bucky for, what, the third time in twenty-four hours—and then manage to find the exact right words to say to stop Bucky from tearing up the world to get back at him. And make no mistake, Bucky was going to think up something incredibly nasty to pay him back. Like making him get on a roller coaster or something.

There was a firm hand on Bucky’s shoulder, pushing him into a chair, and Bucky felt himself acquiesce, realizing how shaky his knees were only when he took the weight off of them. He stared at the note in his hands, reread it. The words didn’t change.

There was a hand on his knee, stopping it from bouncing, which it was doing manically. Bucky looked up, expecting Morita or Jones, but instead found himself staring into the implacable gaze of Ranger Brock Rumlow.

“Gonna be okay, Ranger?” Rumlow asked. He wasn’t concerned. It was a challenge.

Bucky was going to let him know he could keep the niceties in his back pocket and even deeper, but the truth was—the truth was that just that moment of determination, that fiery anger, was enough to burn away the worst of the shock and fill Bucky up with a new, painful intense determination. He _would_ be okay, he _would_ fight back, and he _would_ be here for Steve when he came back. Because Steve would be back. They’d be pilots together soon.

And if he could rack up a kill count in the meantime…

Rumlow smiled, a flat, sharky sort of grin. “Thought so. Come on, we’re going for trials. Were gonna drop in T minus one hour.”

The man who had given Bucky the note was gone. The rest of the squad hadn’t even followed. It was just Bucky and Brock now.

“Well then, we best get going,” Bucky told him.

Rumlow still smiled like he had known this—his attitude, his antagonism—would work to snap Bucky back into focus.

Maybe he had. They were drift compatible, after all.

 

* * *

 

Steve had always wanted to go to Hawaii. Well, his Mama had—talked about it sometimes, when a winter was especially lean.

“Don’t worry, baby,” she would say when Steve was very little, rubbing his back through a bout of coughing that would start every November without fail. “One day, when I get promoted to head nurse and you get just a wee bit bigger, we’ll go to Hawaii. You know, it’s never cold there. It’s warm and green and the birds are huge and have more colors than even your crayon box.”

Sarah Rogers kept a framed postcard from a girl friend who had gone to Honolulu once, and she set it up on the top shelf of her locker at the hospital. It stood right next to the latest of Steve’s school pictures, and one of Bucky and Steve at three years old, sitting in a bubble bath with soap all over everything but them.

Steve hadn’t known about the photo until she died and the hospital had given him the big cardboard box of all the things Sarah had left in her locker. He’d always played with the idea of winning a million dollars in the lottery, or getting rich and famous as an artist, and thought about taking his Mama to somewhere tropical once he inevitably made it big. Too bad that, at fifteen years old, he hadn’t yet made it that far in life.

It was a strange feeling, then, to be stepping, years later, off a military transport plane—okay, rolled off it in a wheelchair, which was irritating and embarrassing and _not_ medically necessary—at the former American Naval Base on Oahu, which was now the PPDC long-term medical outpost. Despite being parked nearly in the middle of the Pacific, the entire island chain had been mostly left alone by the Kaiju. The theory was that the population centers even on Oahu were not even comparable to the other metropolises that had been hit so far. Besides, if Hawaii was hit, what did losing a few dying soldiers matter?

Steve wrenched his thoughts away from the morose. He was _not_ dying; he was here, finally, to make himself better, and stronger. Soon the location of the PPDC medical facilities wouldn’t matter at all, because the Kaiju would be gone, and he—and Bucky—would be the ones to stop them.

Steve expected to be wheeled straight from the plane into a hospital, but he was instead loaded into a truck and driven along picturesque roads, around the outer rim of the island. He plastered himself to the tinted window, trying to take in the landscape that his mother had described to him. The land themselves was expectedly monochromatic—red-green colorblindness was yet another reason that Steve really shouldn’t have passed his original medical intake. However, the blues…the sky, the water, they all were vibrant and brilliant to his eyes. He rolled down the window for a long moment until the unsmiling military driver rolled it back up, smelling the salt air and the tang of humidity.

 _Made it, Mom_ , Steve thought ruefully. _Sort of._

Steve was ushered inside an unadorned, square sort of building just as a military helicopter touched down on top of it. This time, thankfully, he was allowed to walk on his own. He tried not to suddenly regret the loss of the wheelchair, as most of his muscles were still incredibly sore from their forced rictus.

Steve was led down a beige hall. The structure was lit by stark fluorescence and the floor was a bruised-looking linoleum. It wasn’t the same cold concrete of Alaska, but it had its similarities. Steve tried to glean any detail of where he was from his surroundings, but there wasn’t much except for locked steel doors and endless, empty halls.

“Steven!”

Rushing out from a stairwell at the end of the hall came a bedraggled-looking Doctor Erskine. The man flashed a faint grin at him, but his expression was mostly that of harried relief.

“Good, I am just in time. I was afraid you would be waiting long without me and Mr. Stark would try to set you up on his own—“

“Who here is maligning my character now?”

Double-doors that Steve hadn’t quite noticed were built in the wall several yards ahead swung open, and with them came a swaggering, older gentleman wearing rolled-up shirtsleeves and an oily smile. His pencil-thin moustache was greying and looked to be about thirty years out of style, but his eyes were energetic and his posture that of a much younger man.

Erskine jumped and didn’t seem to quite know how to reply, so Steve shrugged and gave the newcomer a bland smile. “Only suggesting that you were enthusiastic to start, Mister…ah, Stark, was it?”

“What, like you haven’t heard of me?” The man had a Brooklyn accent almost as broad as Bucky’s could be when he was tired or agitated. “Howard Stark. One of the greatest Jaeger technicians the world has ever seen? Creator of the original plasma-caster for Jaeger team ‘107’?”

Steve had heard of the achievements, but not the man. He shrugged.

Howard, with his excitedly-twitching mustache, sighed. “Okay, then, what about my kid? Tony Stark, M.I.T professor, real genius. Revolutionized the pilot-to-pilot neural impact systems to be what they are today, now working on the Mach V. You heard of _him_ , kid, or you been living under a rock?”

Tony, Steve _had_ heard of, and was amazed. Tony Stark was only Steve’s age, but the rumors were he had four Ph.D.’s and was working with the best that the PPDC could offer, somewhere on the big base in Hong Kong. He hadn’t realized the man’s father was also active in the service.

“Uh, well, it’s an honor, sir,” Steve said, not sure how to react but wanting to be polite. He reached out a hand for Howard to shake, which he did enthusiastically.

“Yikes, kid, you got a grip! But your hands are bony as the fish I had for dinner last night. Can I get you a sandwich or something?”

“Mr. Stark, Steven is here for his procedure. He cannot eat or drink until after it is finished,” Erskine broke in, sounding somewhat amused and somewhat more long-suffering.

Howard’s eyes widened. “Oh—ohhhh. This is him? The pilot? Our test?”

Erskine merely nodded.

“Well, you’re the boss, boss, but I think I made the pod way too big,” Howard shrugged, sweeping Steve under an arm and leading him inside the double-doors.

The lab in front of him was a shock, compared to the lifeless hallway. Insides, machines hummed and beep, pneumatic hisses seemed to emit at random, and dozens of techs in white coats scurried between readouts and screens. Dominating the chaos of the room, however, was a strange-looking pod, gaping open, featuring a table-like apparatus that was approximately human-sized, and some worrying-looking straps about where limbs should rest.

“You’re goin’ in that,” Howard said unnecessarily.

“Sure figured,” Steve muttered. He felt Erskine put a hand on his back but shrugged it off, squaring his shoulders. “Mind if I ask what for? I’ve been told it’s a procedure—to make it so I can get back in a Jaeger.”

Howard laughed, but not unkindly. He spun around to look Steve in the eyes. “Not just get in a Jaeger, but dominate it. We think we’ve found a way to re-engineer Jaeger tech for the future. Can you imagine—not only would you be physically fit and meet every health requirement to strap on a PONS helmet, but you could also be _universally compatible_.”

Steve wasn’t sure what to think about that, but he knew the benefits would be immense. He thought of his men back at Kodiak who may never see a Jaeger just because they never found the right partner. He thought of Bucky. He wanted to pilot with James Buchanan Barnes more than he wanted anything in the whole world, but what if he could do him one better? What if he could make it so that Bucky was never dependent on him again? Or anyone?

People continued to race around doing who-knew-what, but it didn’t seem like anyone was going to give Steve time to shake off the jet lag or even breathe. A lab tech directed Steve to fit himself into the pod. Howard was right, it did feel awfully big.

As the straps came down and Steve was given a shot of _something_ in his arm, he found himself looking into the kind face of Dr. Erskine. The man had donned a white lab coat and had a mess of electronic tablets in one hand. He wasn’t doing anything, however, just staring at Steve.

“This is going a bit fast,” Steve joked weakly. “Aren’t I supposed to have a psych eval or, I don’t know, some vaccinations?”

“Well, it seems you’re allergic to penicillin,” Erskine replied drily, “So our regular immune boosting regimen won’t cut it.” After a moment, however, he seemed to shake off whatever distracted daze he found himself in. “Steven. You were chosen for a reason. I’ve been watching all the recruits at Kodiak Island for quite some time now, and no one has the leadership skills, heart, and grit I’ve seen in you. I was one of the observers in your Jaeger trials, you know. I know, you did not see me, but quite a few important people were just on the other side of the mirror in the Kwoon.” That was a mess Steve didn’t have time to be distressed about; he was too focused on what Erskine was telling him. “We aren’t just using you as a lab rat, Steven. We’ve had lab rats. What we are doing is going to _work_ and we want you to be the first soldier in a new army. I think that you can lead the world to freedom, Steven.” Erskine reached out and tapped Steve’s chest. “Soon, the only thing inside you that is going to matter is your heart. Your lungs, your illnesses—that will be a thing of the past. It’s time to show the world who Steven Rogers can really be, in your powerful heart.”

Erskine seemed to come back to himself after that. His smile dimmed to something more nervous once more as he exchanged his datapad for a different one handed to him by a tech.

“We’re ready to start!” Howard called from in front of an array of holographic screens. “You good, Rogers?”

“Guess it’s too late for me to ask to go to the bathroom?” Steve called back.

 Howard barked out a laugh and pressed a button on his screen. The pod doors began to lower.

“See you on the other side, Ranger,” Howard yelled.

It was the first time Steve had ever been called "Ranger". He hoped only that the words would soon come true.

The pod finished closing, and the lock clicked into place. Everything went dark.

**Author's Note:**

> In it for the long haul? Because I am. Follows the trajectory of both Captain America movies as well as Pacific Rim -- whatever that means.
> 
> Visit me on Tumblr - picktheonesthatlast
> 
> Or find my author page at https://tamerlorika.wordpress.com/


End file.
